Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, May 26, 1995 TAG: 9505260045
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-19 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAVID NOVA
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Or this: ``We all hold to the inspiration of the Old Testament and accept the Ten Commandments as the fundamental law of God.'' Did Pat Buchanan say it? Or Ralph Reed? This statement was made by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
American history is replete with government leaders who were devoutly religious. In Roanoke, we have our own tradition of religious leaders in government. For decades, the Rev. Noel Taylor served with grace and dignity as mayor. Today the Rev. Nelson Harris provides wisdom and leadership as the chairman of the city School Board.
Given America's tradition of trusting in leaders who trust in God, why do so many people fear the so-called ``radical religious right?''
Those aligned with the religious right in America are not scary because they are religious. Religious expression is an essential ingredient for any free and open democracy. Members of the religious right are scary because they are radical. And they are radical because they seek to end the long-established separation between church and state. This is most evident in the continuing effort by the Christian Coalition and other groups to control the Republican Party, in Virginia and elsewhere. Their vision is to have the Republican Party be both a religious entity and a political entity.
Such a marriage between the religious and the political, between the sacred and the profane, is ill-advised. When the wall of separation between church and state is eroded, religion (even the dominant religion) suffers.
Thomas Jefferson believed that religious liberty was ``the most inalienable and sacred of all human rights.'' Jefferson understood that religious liberty and religious autonomy are necessities in any democracy. Religion acts as an alternative voice of authority, thereby denying the government absolute control over its citizens. If the government becomes the only voice of conscience, tyranny soon follows.
By undermining the separation between church and state, the voice of religion is corrupted for political gain. The first 100 days of Congress were a testament to the fact that when politics and religion are mixed, when the wall of separation is set aside, it is religion (not politics) that be damned.
In the 100 days of the Contract With America, the religious right supported term limits, a constitutional amendment to balance the budget, cuts to social programs such as school lunches, tax cuts for families making up to $200,000 a year, tort reform and lifting the ban on assault weapons. The Christian Coalition publicly announced it was spending $1 million to see that all aspects of the Contract With America were passed by Congress. After 100 days, the policies espoused by religious conservatives are virtually indistinguishable from those long held by the Republican National Committee.
In their zeal to make America a Christian nation, the religious right is supporting public policies that have no theological bases. Instead of deriving just and moral policies by studying Scripture, they accept the ideology of a political party and then seek theological justification for it.
As a result, the radical right's own religious ideals become trivialized. They become tools for espousing and justifying governmental policy. The sacred and the profane become one. Politics begins to determine correct ethical beliefs, instead of the other way around. Suddenly, to be ultra-conservative is to be a good Christian. Moderate and liberal social policies evoke claims of ``anti-religious bigotry.'' If there was ever a road paved with good intentions, this is it.
James Madison's 1785 argument for maintaining a separation of church and state was a religious plea from a devout Christian. ``Whilst we assert for ourselves a freedom to embrace, to profess and to observe the Religion which we believe to be of divine origin, we cannot deny an equal freedom to those whose minds have not yet yielded to the evidence that has convinced us. If this freedom be abused, it is an offence against God, not against man.'' In other words, according to Madison, lifting the separation between church and state is not so much undemocratic as it is ungodly and sacrilegious.
Some influential evangelical Christians are beginning to recognize that God cannot be spelled GOP. At a recent convention of Christian activists in Florida, conservative columnist Cal Thomas received a standing ovation when he told his audience that the good works of the church ``are compromised when the Gospel is politicized, when the pulpit becomes a tool of political organization.''
To date, it is the Republican Party that has profited from the marriage of politics and religion. The November elections were evidence of that. However, conservative Republicans should also be wary of undermining the separation of church and state. Their relationship with the religious right comes at a very precarious time in history - the end of the second millennium.
It is no coincidence that the meteoric rise of the Christian right comes in the final decade of the second millennium. Just beneath the surface of the American psyche lies the recognition that the year 2000 could bring apocalyptic change in the United States. Nowhere is this more evident than in the public proclamations of the leaders of the religious right.
In the Roanoke Times & World-News earlier this month, Shirley Dobson, chairwoman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force, called for a school-prayer amendment to the Constitution, saying: ``Our country stands at a great crossroads, not unlike the crisis that threatened the stability during the Civil War ... and just as our forefathers sought God in times of trouble, so must we seek his face.'' Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, regularly makes statements such as, ``America is going to enter the next millennium in convulsions. We are going to see turmoil and disruption that will make the Civil War look civil. It's going to be a horrifying time and it's the judgment of God.'' Even Rush Limbaugh has begun talking about ``a violent revolution in America'' in the next few years over property rights.
Perhaps Judgment Day is coming in the year 2000. Perhaps not. Regardless, some groups in America have acted as if biblical prophecy were imminent truth. The Branch Davidians predicted that apocalyptic violence would occur in America. In preparing for Judgment Day, they contributed to their own apocalyptic demise.
Now some militia groups and some conservative Christian groups have begun to act as if the Book of Revelations was their itinerary. Their preparation for the fulfillment of prophecy could well lead to the enactment of their own apocalyptic vision. The Republican Party must consider whether association with such radical elements of American society is a political liability in the long run.
Whatever the future holds, we would be wise to maintain a strong separation between church and state. The Establishment Clause of the Constitution was not instituted to keep one religion from dominating an otherwise secular government. The proverbial wall of separation is designed to protect religion from government. Let us not undermine religious liberty at a time in our history when we need the wisdom of religion most.
David Nova, social action chairman of Temple Emanuel in Roanoke, serves on the boards of several ecumenical ministries.
by CNB